Tuesday, June 24, 2014

It's fascinating how online tools can expand our knowledge of a period/topic and how easy it is to share those discoveries. My little state of Rhode Island has a long history of printing--newspapers, one sheet broadsides and pamphlets. The Rhode Island Historical Society using Google Maps, an interactive timeline and lots of data compiled by bibliographers created an online Atlas of the RI Book Trade.

Scroll through the timeline to see what's available.

The star system identifies whether detail locations are available for printers.

To see the exact locations of these printers zoom into the map.

Click on one of those blue balloons to see details about a printer.

An easy to use guide helps users understand how to get the most out of this interesting project. Here's a fun tip. Use the page full screen then click "view with historical overlays" to view the locations on historical maps from the RIHS collections.

It's fascinating how online tools can expand our knowledge of a period/topic and how easy it is to share those discoveries. My little state of Rhode Island has a long history of printing--newspapers, one sheet broadsides and pamphlets. The Rhode Island Historical Society using Google Maps, an interactive timeline and lots of data compiled by bibliographers created an online Atlas of the RI Book Trade.

Scroll through the timeline to see what's available.

The star system identifies whether detail locations are available for printers.

To see the exact locations of these printers zoom into the map.

Click on one of those blue balloons to see details about a printer.

An easy to use guide helps users understand how to get the most out of this interesting project. Here's a fun tip. Use the page full screen then click "view with historical overlays" to view the locations on historical maps from the RIHS collections.